The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1887-07-21
SOME NOTABLE EXAMPLES WHICH
ILLUSTRATE ITS POWER.

Faith Kill Quite IS Potent as Faith
Cure-Efects of Practical Joke.
Sentenced to Death-Gen. Johnston's
story-A Terrified Porter.
Some time ago girl, about 16 years Of
age, had a prescription made up at o
chemists. The prescription was double
one-part being for internal use, and part
for external application only. The usual
red "Poison" label was affixed to the
bottle containing the lotion, and verbal
caution was also given. The girl having
been under medical treatment for some
time previous, was permitted to take and
apply the medicine herself; and so careful
was she that her precautions to avoid mis-
takes were the subject of frequent COM
ment and occasional banter. One day
male cousin, having unfortunately re-
solved to play her a practical joke, trans
posed the labels on the bottles-which in
other respects were not very much unlike
soon after the girl had taken her first
dose.
In an apparently careless way her at
tention was directed to the bottles, and,
to her horror, she discovered that she
must have drunk some of the lotion.
Within half an hour she had frightened
herself into the belief that she was
poisoned. She complained of burning
sensation in the throat and stomach, of
collie, and other symptoms of poisoning.
A little later she was seized with an over
powering tendency to sleep. The doctor
was summoned in haste. He heard tho
girls story, and applied such remedies as
he thought proper. But the girl grew
worse. She was sinking SO rapidly that
at last the frightened and hitherto silent
culprit confessed what he had done. At
first the girl did not believe him; and it
was not until the doctor had taken large
dose from the red labeled bottle that she
was convinced. Then she began to re-
cover, and in a few hours the immediate
effects of the practical joke had left hor.
THOUGHT SHE WAS PARALYZED. !
A well authenticated case is told of a
young lady who for seven years or moro
has been under the impression that she
is paralyzed. She looks strong and
healthy, but lies all day on a couch, and
has TO he carried about in an invalid
chair. She shrieks with pain wheneve, q
limb is moved. Her parents have taken
her 10 at least dozen physicians-some
Of the most eminent men in London-and
all agree that she is in perfect health.
One of them plainly told her, after most
exhaustive examination, that she was
simply wasting her parents money, and
added that he would gladly give el00 in
exchange for such d constitution as hers.
Some years ago Napoleon III, while
emperor Of France, permitted a French
physician TO experiment on a convict who
was sentenced to death. The condemned
man was delivered to the physician, who
had him strapped to a table and blind
folded, ostensibly for the purpose of being
bled to death. Near the dropping head
was placed vessel of water, which, by
means of n Siphon arrangement, trickled
audibly into basin below, at the same
moment that superficial scratch with a
q needle was made right across the cul-
prit's neck. Perfect silence was MAIN
tanned, and in six minutes the man was
dead.
KILLED BY A JOKE.
Gen. Johnston, leader of the Confed-
crate armies, tells of a case that came
under his own observation. He, when q
lieutenant, learned that some acquaint-
ances had concocted a plan for testing the
power of imagination on the human sys-
TEN. The plan was that half a dozen of
them should, apparently by accident, meet
some particular individual and comment
on his appearance of extreme illness. A
healthy young man was selected for ex-
pertinent, and the result of this joke was
that he sickened and died.
Another case is said to have occurred in
q university town in Scotland. A college
porter having made himself particularly
obnoxious to the students, they resolved
to be revenged upon him. For this pur-
pose they decoyed him into q room one
night, held mock inquiry into his bad
behavior, and, with great outward show
of solemnity, sentenced him to be decap-
itated-the execution to take place at once.
The terrified porter was led to a quiet
corner, where stood a huge block and a
keen AK; he was then blindfolded and
compelled to kneel and lay his head on the
block. The executioner struck him on the
neck with a wet towel, and the porter
was lifted up-dead!-New York Home
Journal